TRUMP IS ABOUT TO BE TRUMPED BY BANNON

On Wednesday, the Trump campaign shifted top campaign
staff: the new CEO of the campaign is, predictably and hilariously,
Steven K. Bannon, the current chairman of Breitbart News. I have a bit
of experience with Bannon, given that I was the editor-at-large of
Breitbart News for four years, and worked closely with Breitbart and
Bannon.
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Here’s what you need to know about Bannon, as well as new campaign manager Kellyanne Conway.

1. Steve Bannon Turned Breitbart Into Trump Pravda For His Own Personal Gain.
Back in March, I quit Breitbart News when it became clear to me that
they had decided that loyalty to Donald Trump outweighed loyalty to
their own employees, helping Trump smear one of their own reporters,
Michelle Fields, by essentially calling her a liar for saying that she
had been grabbed by then-Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski.
Here’s what I wrote at the time:

Andrew Breitbart built his
life and his career on one mission: fight the bullies. But Andrew’s life
mission has been betrayed. Indeed, Breitbart News, under the
chairmanship of Steve Bannon, has put a stake through the heart of
Andrew’s legacy. In my opinion, Steve Bannon is a bully, and has sold
out Andrew’s mission in order to back another bully, Donald Trump; he
has shaped the company into Trump’s personal Pravda…the facts are
undeniable: Breitbart News has become precisely the reverse of what
Andrew would have wanted. Steve Bannon and those who follow his lead
should be ashamed of themselves.

Not to say "I told you so," but I did tell you so.
.

2. Bannon Uses Celebrity Conservatives To Elevate His Personal Profile. Bannon began receiving conservative media attention for his documentary Generation Zero. And he began elevating his profile by latching onto Michele Bachmann with his documentary Fire From The Heartland. But he truly insinuated himself into the circles of conservative power by making a 2011 documentary about Sarah Palin, The Undefeated.
His connection with Palin upped his brand in the movement
significantly. He soon began appearing on Fox News with Sean Hannity
fairly regularly, became personal friends with Hannity, and met Andrew
Breitbart. He insinuated himself into Breitbart’s business by lending
him office space, then made a documentary starring Breitbart, Occupy Unmasked.
When Breitbart died, his business partner Larry Solov offered Bannon
chairmanship of the company. Bannon then turned Breitbart into his
personal domain, making himself a regularly bylined columnist (certainly
rare for a major media company) and installing himself as a radio host
on Breitbart Radio on Sirius XM. Finally, he used his role as Breitbart
CEO to turn the outlet into Trump Pravda, creating a stepping stone to
close connection with Trump. Breitbart publicly burned bridges with
everyone to maintain its Trump loyalty. That was Bannon, a
scorched-earth personal opportunist.
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3. Bannon Took At Least One Major Breitbart Investor For A Serious Ride. One of the main investors in Breitbart News is Robert Mercer.
The Mercer family put millions of dollars into a Ted Cruz super PAC
during this election cycle, even as Bannon manipulated Breitbart News
into a Cruz-bashing Trump propaganda outlet. The spokesperson for the
Mercer family was Kellyanne Conway, who has now been installed as
Trump’s campaign manager. I have been reliably informed by sources
associated with the pro-Cruz super PAC that for months, as Bannon was
using Breitbart News to promote Trump, the Mercers were defending
Bannon’s neutrality to other Cruz supporters worried about Breitbart’s
dishonest coverage about Cruz.
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4. Breitbart’s Staff Lusts After Trump Involvement. Long before the billionaire officially entered the presidential race, Bannon was close to him; in April 2014,
the Trump offices described Bannon thusly: “MAJOR SUPPORTER OF MR.
TRUMP.” The new team at Trump headquarters will undoubtedly include all
the Breitbart staffers who openly lusted after power within the Trump
campaign: Joel Pollak, the Breitbart lawyer who desperately wanted to be
a Trump speechwriter, and wrote a disgusting hit piece about me
personally when I left and accurately accused the website of becoming an
adjunct to the campaign; Matthew Boyle, the pseudo-journalist who
reportedly bragged about becoming Trump’s press secretary; Milo
Yiannopoulos, the Trump-worshipping alt-right droog stooge. They’re all
in with their Godking, now.
.

5. Under Bannon’s Leadership, Breitbart Openly Embraced The White Supremacist Alt-Right. Andrew Breitbart despised racism.
Truly despised it. He used to brag regularly about helping to integrate
his fraternity at Tulane University. He insisted that racial stories be
treated with special care to avoid even the whiff of racism. With
Bannon embracing Trump, all that changed. Now Breitbart has become the
alt-right go-to website, with Yiannopoulos pushing white ethno-nationalism
as a legitimate response to political correctness, and the comment
section turning into a cesspool for white supremacist mememakers.
.

6. This Is Precisely The Sort of Corrupt Media Relationship Breitbart Used To Abhor. Andrew Breitbart used his memoir, Righteous Indignation,
to target one thing above all else: what he called the Democrat-Media
Complex. He hated the merger of the Democrats and the media, and
particularly despised their lie of objectivity. Breitbart News never
claimed to be objective. But until Trump won the nomination, leadership
at Breitbart News maintained that they had not become a loudspeaker for
Trumpism. That was obviously a lie, and one Breitbart would hate. HATE.
Now, it’s clear that Breitbart News is indeed Bannon.com and Trumpbart
News. That’s pathetic and disgusting.
.

7. Trump’s Campaign Strategy Could Be The Launch Of A New Media Outlet.
Because Bannon’s ambitions extend to Steve Bannon, he’ll tell Trump
he’s doing a fantastic job even if he isn’t. That’s how Bannon Svengalis
political figures and investors – by investing them in his personal
genius, then hollowing them out from the inside. There’s a reason Sarah
Palin went from legitimate political figure to parody artist to Trump
endorser, with Steve Bannon standing alongside her every step of the
way. There’s a reason Breitbart News went from hard-charging news outlet
to drooling Trump mouthpiece. Bannon emerges from all of this
unscathed. So what’s next on his agenda? If Trump wins, he’s in a
position of high power; if Trump loses, Bannon could head up a new media
empire with Trump’s support and the involvement of new Trump supporter
and ousted former Fox News head Roger Ailes. Look for Sean Hannity to be
a part of any such endeavor.
.

8. Bannon Is A Legitimately Sinister Figure. Many former
employees of Breitbart News are afraid of Steve Bannon. He is a
vindictive, nasty figure, infamous for verbally abusing supposed friends
and threatening enemies. Bannon is a smarter version of Trump: he’s an
aggressive self-promoter who name-drops to heighten his profile and woo
bigger names, and then uses those bigger names as stepping stools to his
next destination. Trump may be his final destination. Or it may not. He
will attempt to ruin anyone who impedes his unending ambition, and he
will use anyone bigger than he is – for example, Donald Trump – to get
where he wants to go. Bannon knows that in the game of thrones, you win
or die. And he certainly doesn’t intend to die. He’ll kill everyone else
before he goes.
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Bannon’s ascension is the predictable
consummation of a romance he ardently pursued. I joked with friends
months ago that by the end of the campaign, Steve Bannon would be
running Trump’s campaign from a bunker. That’s now reality. Every
nightmare for actual conservatives has come true in this campaign. Why
not this one, too?

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About Me

A Texan who loves the truth and hates the lying, cheating, and deliberate prevarication that characterizes so much of our civic discourse these days.
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RIPOSTE, n. 1. Fencing: a quick thrust after parrying a lunge 2. a quick sharp return in speech or action; counterstroke.
- The Random House Dictionary of the English Language...........
You can contact me by sending an email to me at: leorugiens23@gmail.com